


Abhorrence

by m_class



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: (one of whom doesn’t make it through the fic but one of whom is just fine), Aftermath of Torture, Blood Loss, Dissociation, Established Relationship, F/F, Flashbacks both narrative and psychological, Grief, Heavy Angst, Hurt/Comfort, I take it to be a truth universally acknowledged that, Injury, Minor Character Death, Non-Chronological, Psychological Trauma, Season/Series 02 AU, Torture, and food, background Hugh Culber/Paul Stamets, brief mention of alcohol, brief mentions of Lorca creeping on Burnham, gratuitous Shakespeare references, is a trait shared by many a Starfleet officer in addition to AOS Spock, m_class’s 2018-2019 completed-WIP collection, my attempt at the ‘Person A was tortured and Person B comforts them’ trope, unreality, “death’s door and [they’re] quoting Shakespeare”
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-27
Updated: 2020-08-27
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:40:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,102
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26135131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/m_class/pseuds/m_class
Summary: When she is rescued after days of torture, Tracy Pollard finds herself sliding between past and present as her loved ones try to help her hold on between one moment and the next.
Relationships: Hugh Culber & Tracy Pollard, Michael Burnham & Hugh Culber, Michael Burnham & Jett Reno, Michael Burnham/Tracy Pollard, Tracy Pollard & Jett Reno
Comments: 2
Kudos: 9





	Abhorrence

**Author's Note:**

> Fic timeline -  
> Takes place in an amorphous during- or post- Season 2 AU where either the finale plays out differently or there’s more downtime between Plot Events and the plot takes many more months to unfold; at the point in time in which this fic takes place, Hugh has been back alive for several months, Paul In A Coma 2.0 never happened and Paul is fine, Michael and Tracy have been together for around four or five months, and Michael has (as mentioned) done her spin around the timeline in the Red Angel suit.
> 
> References/Acknowledgements -  
> Reflections on trauma and linear time lightly inspired by the DS9 pilot (and yes, I thought of this particular Shakespeare quote only because it’s the one Calvin quotes in A Wrinkle In Time. ;) Some of the way that I tried to play with non-chronological imagery and emotion in this fic was inspired by [Starshine](https://archiveofourown.org/works/18458339), elissastillstands’s searingly immersive Red Angel fic. (Also, the “tachyons and time crystals” line in this feels unsettlingly familiar and I worry I accidentally stole it from somewhere; apologies/please let me know if it was a fanfic you read or wrote(!)
> 
> Writing notes -  
> This is basically the completed and edited version of a cathartic fic I started last year when I had a particularly bad week and was all ‘time to go write some favorite characters dealing with tHE WORST ANGST IMAGINABLE’ (or, okay, probably not the /worst/ angst imaginable, since there’s a relatively hopeful ending, but it definitely warrants the #Heavy Angst tag).
> 
> On a writing timeline note, since this was something I was throwing together in late fall, it ended up being something of a casual combo of some elements in a couple of longer WIPs I'd been working on and had on my mind (namely Tracy in distress and a non-chronological narrative), so now when I finally actually post those longer fics I’ve been working on for over a year they may seem a bit repetitive, but I’ve decided to just not worry about that ;) (Also, Íris! There’s a lot more of them where this came from.)

Time breaks. Time breaks, the linear progression of moments wheeling and dissolving in on itself and hurling her back to the cold and the damp and the sound of screaming, and she imagines that this is something similar to what Michael told her happened when she piloted the Red Angel suit, hurtling through the timeline in a bright shower of instants. Something similar to what Michael told her happened when she piloted the Red Angel suit, but she didn’t choose to step into a suit, didn’t choose any of this, and all she wants is to land once again in the present moment, the present moment that is warmer and quieter and safe. Except it isn’t safe from what happened, what happened always will have happened, and so because it always will have happened, it is still happening, and time _breaks_ —

“—this might be, uh, more bad than just the bruises, I think she’s going into shock—”

“Carrying her as I ran was less than ideal, Reno—“ Hugh’s voice is distant, filtering through the humming sound of a shuttle engine at warp. “Start the tricorder mapping her internal injuries, and keep her warm. I’ll be back there in a few, we just need to clear their solar system—“

“Roger.” Tracy can hear the whirr of the medical tricorder as Jett’s voice gets closer to her, dropping low and gentle. “You’re gonna be okay, Doc.” Her face swims into focus above Tracy. “Michael’s here and you’re gonna see her in just a few minutes. Hang in there for Michael, okay?”

Tracy nods. For Michael. Michael. Something inside her recoils at the thought of Michael touching her even as she yearns for that touch. What happened happened apart from Michael, in another place and another time; a past that now tangles into the present, burying itself in her bones. The recent past has buried itself inside her, and the thought of Michael’s touch against her skin makes her feel like Michael’s skin will burn upon contact. Or hers will.

Her heart feels as though it is trying to beat its way out of her chest, fluttering frantically like hummingbird wings. The medical tricorder in Jett’s hand begins to shriek and Tracy feels her vision blurring into a dark and sparking space, an infinite vacuum without stars, where she floats alongside her hummingbird heart. A hummingbird, or a butterfly, too delicate for the crushing weight of the universe that presses around it, heavy as vacuum or mercury. A snatch of old poetry drifts from the depths of her mind, _for thou wast a spirit too delicate to act her abhorred commands, she did confine thee, into a cloven pine…_

But it was not wood but stone, a stone wall between her and the other captured officer, their moans floating through to her through the stone. It was stone that they enclosed her in, and stone that they pressed her against when they pulled her into other rooms, metal burning and thudding against skin until she’d told them what they asked for, which was not the same as telling them the truth, because she told them about Prospero, Miranda’s father, _no, that’s from the play,_ the play drifting through her in the now-now in the hummingbird darkness; in the then-now, she’d told them about Lorca, who had acted like a father to Michael until his true desires for her were made clear, who in his next breath after he reminded her how he’d freed her had reminded her that he could lock her away again, into the cloven pine— _no, that’s the play again,_ and it was Ariel, not Miranda, in the pine, besides. Wasn’t it? Or was it Hugh, who Lorca had threatened? That was what she told them, as they beat at her with metal and feet and hands, sinking herself back into the past so that she could unknow what she knew. She had told them about Lorca, the captain of the Discovery (not Pike; that hadn’t happened; she was back in the past, the present; that was only an imagined future); and how he was angry that the technology the Discovery was researching wasn’t working yet (it hadn’t worked; that wasn’t something that had happened yet); because there was a problem with the navigator, Stamets, because it was biological but it wasn’t stable; it nearly killed him and now he was lying comatose in sickbay, in sickbay with his partner desperately watching over him (it wasn’t the other way around; it wasn’t Hugh dead and Paul mourning him, because that hadn’t happened yet; hadn’t happened yet), and she, Tracy, didn’t know any more, because she wasn’t his physician, and she wasn’t a research engineer; that was all she knew; that was all she knew.

Something is confusing, now, because she feels a sharp jab in her left arm, and that makes her realize by contrast that she is not in pain, or at least not that kind of pain; there are no longer fists and feet hitting her but only the bruises they have left, bruises and burns and bleeding—which, yes, bleeding, that goes with what Jett is saying, muttering somewhere in the darkness above her about hypovolemic shock. Jett, here, leaning over her in the now-now. Tracy feels something like a laugh tear through her at the fucking irony. In the now-now, she is trapped in the then-now, just as in the then-now, she had wrapped herself in the then. Had known that she would likely not be able to tell them nothing, and so she had wrapped herself in the time from twelve months ago, old intel, the old present, and told herself with all her heart that that was the real one. Starfleet Academy, medical school, silent lecture halls where you could hear a pin drop as lecturers who knew of what they spoke said _under torture, most people will say_ anything _to make the pain stop,_ and so all she could do was try to make her _anything_ an older truth.

She doesn’t remember if it worked. She remembers passing out, and pleading, and days and hours spent floating through the burning pain. She doesn’t remember if it worked, and she remembers Pike’s name spilling from her lips at least once, so it probably didn’t.

“—something to me, please say something, Pollard—” Jett’s voice is drifting to her, ragged, through time and space, and Tracy tries to blink the darkness from her vision; tries to float her way back to Jett. She can’t see the woman in front of her, but she can feel, suddenly, Jett's hand gripping her right hand. Tentatively, she moves a finger, and she can feel Jett’s breath catch in relief.

“You’re gonna be okay, Pollard, Tracy, you’re gonna be okay,” she says. “I need you to open your eyes, if you can do that. I need you to open your eyes.”

Tracy blinks again, her vision still hazy, Jett’s face half-lost in shifting clouds of time. _You look like a woman who would understand irony,_ she tries to say, but all she manages is a moan.

“You’re doing good, Tracy. You’re doing so good, and Hugh is going to be here soon.”

Hugh?

It’s worth the nearly impossible effort it takes to speak, now, because doesn’t Jett need to know the truth, however horrific?

“Hugh’s dead,” she manages to whisper.

Jett blinks in momentary confusion, then her eyes widen in understanding. She is gripping Tracy’s right hand, the hand of the arm without the IV in it, and now she squeezes it more tightly. “Hugh is alive, Tracy,” she says gently. “He did die, I know you remember that he did die, but Paul and Michael went into the mycelial network and found him again. You checked him out afterwards, his new body, and gave him a clean bill of health. He told me how thrilled you were to see him again—”

Of course. Of course Hugh is alive. This is now, not then, and Hugh is alive.

“He carried me,” she whispers. A memory from now, or almost now; no more than a few minutes ago. He lifted her over his shoulders and her body screamed in protest as he ran, but in the moments he was still, she could feel his heartbeat and hear his breathing and smell his jacket, aftershave and sickbay disinfectant and Starfleet-issue laundry soap.

“Yeah. Yeah, he did.” Jett is smiling now, her eyes dark with care and her mouth twisted in a smile of relief. Squeezing Tracy’s hand, she lets go of it for a moment to fiddle with some of the equipment at Tracy’s side. Tracy’s vision is beginning to clear slightly, and she realizes she must have been losing a really stupid amount of blood; her entire body still aches and burns but her heart is no longer fluttering for dear life.

“He did carry you,” Jett says, turning back to her, “but you’re stuck with me for like another minute and a half because we’ve gotta get ourselves out of this system, and wouldn’t’cha know, Hugh’s our best relief copilot after Gen got himself knocked out of commission saving the day, Han Solo wannabe that he is. Though not knocked out enough to be unable to make smart remarks, apparently.”

“I heard that!” comes a slightly slurred voice from across the cramped shuttle, and Tracy blinks, squinting at the dim form of Rhys, curled on his side under a blanket on the other pull-out medical cot.

“He’s gonna be fine,” Jett says, before Tracy can attempt to ask. “He’s gonna be fine, and probably get a medal or something for covering us. He’s gonna be fine, and you’re gonna be fine, and Michael’s gonna be fine, and you’re gonna see her in a few minutes, as soon as she can put this fucker on autopilot so I can go up and babysit it, yeah? You’re gonna see her in a few minutes.”

“I’d prefer an awesome party,” comes a mumble from the other cot. “To a medal.”

Jett smiles just slightly. “Can you tell me how you’re feeling right now, Tracy?” she asks gently. “Is there anywhere that really hurts?”

The question is good, the question is fine, but it was the question she asked through the stone wall, calling quietly across when their captors had gone, and time breaks, depositing her back into stone walls and dim silence.

 _My leg,_ the officer from the USS Euphrates calls back, their voice shaking slightly. _They shot it with some kind of—some kind of plasma weapon, I think. The burn’s deep; really—really deep. No bleeding._

 _All right,_ Tracy tells them, pressing her palm against the stone. _I’m a doctor, and I’m going help you to take care of it. We’re going to figure out what to do._

***  


“—dissociating, or having a flashback, I’m not sure which.” It’s Hugh’s voice, coming from somewhere above her, and the scent of him again, aftershave and laundry soap.

“Poor kid.” Jett’s voice, exhausted and grim. The sounds around Tracy are floating through to her hazy and muted, as if through water.

Jett. Jett, the shuttle, the Shakespeare play and Rhys’s party and Tracy’s hummingbird heart. Tracy closes her eyes, realizing for the first time that she can smell Jett, too, and had just been assuming that that scent of engine grease was coming from the shuttle around them.

“Can I hold her hand again?”

“Better not, while she’s in this state. Some people can become more distressed or lash out physically if they’re touched during a flashback.”

“Roger that.”

“You can talk to her, though.” Tracy can hear Hugh moving around beside on the other side of her, replacing instruments into the shuttle’s medkit. “We don’t want you to feel alone, Trace,” he adds, gently, voice now directed toward her. “We’re right here with you. We’re here.”

“Right. Well, talking to you, Tracy, that’s always been one of my favorite activities in sickbay, so it’s about time I returned the favor, eh?” Tracy blinks, feeling caught in the haze, the warm light of the shuttle shifting into the coldness of silence and stone and then back again as Jett’s voice threads around her, a lifeline of warmth anchoring her to this newer, warmer instant. Her vision is connecting itself back to the present, and she can half-see Jett beside her, as though peering at something in a dream.

“Speaking of sickbay,” Jett continues, “You’re gonna be just fine, Doc. Hugh’s gotten you fixed up for now, and you’re gonna need some surgery when we get back to the ship, but you’re gonna be okay. We just need to get this field patch job fixed up so it’s nice and permanent, right?” Tracy can hear the crooked smile in Jett’s voice, and she tries to smile back. “Hugh’s gonna send your specs to sickbay as soon as we’re in comms range, so Íris’ll be ready for ya,” Jett continues. “They’ll get ya all fixed up, and you’ll be up-an’-at-‘em again this time tomorrow. Everything’s gonna be okay.”

“Okay,” Tracy murmurs faintly. Jett seems so concerned about her, and Tracy wants to reassure her. “Íris…can,” she adds. Her words feel shaky, too heavy to make it out of her mouth, and she takes a breath, attempting to put more volume into her almost-inaudible voice. “They… _will._ They’re good.” Íris Gonçalves, Discovery’s CMO, is known—and teased—primarily for being a research physician/lab nerd, but they’re also one of Discovery’s most experienced surgeons, after Jake Morris, currently on paternity leave, and Tracy herself.

“Yeah, they are.” Jett smiles, relief warm in her eyes as Tracy’s vision slides further back to the warm and humming present. “And they’re gonna be so glad to see you, Tracy. In just a few hours,” she continues again, “we’ll be back, and they’ll be getting you all fixed up.”

At the sight of the relief in Jett’s eyes, Tracy feels relieved herself. Reassure Jett: check. But isn’t there something else she’s supposed to be doing right now as well? If there’s a medical emergency, as Jett is saying, then she should be acting; doing something. Or—no. No, _she’s_ the medical emergency; she’s the one who is injured. Isn’t she? She can’t seem to get a grip on what’s happening; all she can feel is confusion and a vague panic around the edges of her consciousness.

Hugh, no longer fussing with the medkit, is beside her now, his voice gentle. “How are you feeling right now, Trace? Do you hurt anywhere?”

She can’t seem to make sense of the question. The pain was _then_ , and this is _now_ , but _now_ is connected to _then_ , _then_ when they hurt her so much. Torture, of the most literal and physical variety: something that seems it would happen in a book or a film or be talked about in a lecture hall, not something that would happen to her in reality. But now the only reality that she can touch is this reality, this reality where the unthinkable has happened and the shuttle is humming softly around her as though it hasn’t.

Hugh’s face is tilted toward her. He asked her a question, she remembers, but now she can’t remember what it was that he asked. Or did he ask anything at all? Maybe he’s just expecting her to say something; to say something about the emergency? But—no. The emergency was in the past. It was in the past that she had to figure out what instructions to call gently through the wall to the officer from the USS Euphrates, and to listen to their replies when they called back. It was in the past that she needed to talk with them, and sing to them, and joke with them, and listen for their answers.

Tracy blinks, staring around her at walls that are grey duranium sheeting and not grey stone; air that is warm instead of chilled. It was in the past that she was on the other side of the wall. Now Tracy herself is the emergency, and Jett said she was going to be okay.

She doesn’t feel okay. Time and reality are warping around her, and her mind is still laced with that vague sense of panic, thoughts and intentions crumbling and disintegrating as soon as she thinks them.

“I am sorry,” she tells Hugh, forming the words very carefully. “I do not think that I am doing what I am supposed to be doing.”

“You’re doing just fine, Trace,” he tells her. “Don’t worry, Trace, you’re doing just fine.”

“I should be able to figure out what to do. Everything’s missing. I didn’t think anyone could hurt me so much. Now time isn’t working,” she tries to explain. Then: “Am I drunk? Everything’s all weird.”

“You’re okay, Trace.” Hugh’s voice is steady and infinitely tender. “Can you look at me?”

Tracy blinks, trying to focus on his face.

“Yeah. There you go.” He is smiling, smiling down at her, though his eyes are stormy somewhere beneath the tenderness. “There you are. You’re going to be okay, and you’re doing everything you need to be doing. You’re doing everything right, Trace, and we’re going to take care of you now. We’re going to take it from here.”

 _Take care._ The words bring her back to something from longer ago, a conversation, no, an argument. An argument about how they all haven’t been taking enough care of—

“Michael,” Tracy breathes. “She’ll be worried; this—this isn’t fair; someone needs to check on Michael—”

“We’re going to look out for Michael,” Hugh says, gently but with certainty, before adding more quietly. “I know I—we all haven’t always done half as much as we should have, in the past, to look out for Michael on the Discovery. But we've talked about that, now. You and I and Jett and Ronald and Gen and Íris and Jake and Klaudija, we talked about that last month, and we’re going to be here for her, now. I promise _,_ Tracy.”

Tracy nods slowly. “Thank you,” she manages.

“You don’t have to thank us,” Hugh says softly. “You shouldn’t have to thank any of us for doing what we should have been doing to look out for your partner all along. Michael’s right up there at the helm, and she’s okay, and we’re going to make sure she stays okay. We’re going to take care of her, too." His gaze meets hers, eyes filled with intention. “I _promise_ you that.”

“We’re gonna be here for both of you right now,” Jett echoes, and there is a trace of something that goes beyond intention in her voice, something like anger, or maybe even something that goes beyond anger; something like an ache. Horror. Yes. Tracy remembers now; the things Jett said when she joined the Discovery and first discovered how Michael had been treated on the ship. And she remembers way Hugh was the first, even before Sylvia Tilly, to look out for Michael, back when she was still a specialist, on the ship at Lorca’s whim and ostracized by the rest.

Jett and Hugh were horrified by what happened to Michael, and horror means safe, or at least safer. Horror and courage, the two combined. Yes.

Tracy nods again.

“You’ve been there for Paul and I,” Hugh says softly, “through all these things that we’ve been through. We’re going to be right here beside you, Trace. And we’re going to be here for Michael, too.” His voice is steady and sure. “Paul and I will be here,” he continues, “and so will Jett and Gen here, and so will the others. We’re right here beside you.”

Paul?

“Paul…” Tracy says hesitantly, unsure how to bring it up. Hugh’s brow crinkles slightly, his eyes meeting hers attentively.

“He’s…” Tracy continues, licking her dry lips. “Paul is...going to be all right? From the network?” The mycelial network, too many jumps, Paul lying on a biobed…

Hugh looks puzzled. “Paul is fine, Trace,” he says, voice reassuring and slightly confused. “Paul is just fine.”

Tracy closes her eyes and opens them again, trying to remember. “The network…he was in a coma,” she hazards. “He’s okay?”

“She’s been—going in and out of time a little,” Jett says to Hugh. “Earlier she asked me if _you_ were…” Out of the corner of her eye, Tracy sees Jett trail off with a sympathetic grimace.

Hugh’s eyes clear with understanding again. “Yes,” he tells Tracy. “Yes, Paul is just fine.” His voice is soft; sure. “Yes, Lorca tricked him into doing too many jumps and getting hurt, but that happened nearly a year ago now. That was a year ago,” he repeats, “and now Paul is fine.”

“Lorca...of course he did,” Tracy murmurs. “Neither of you would act his abhorred commands, and so he confined you in the cloven pine…”

“Huh?” Now it’s Jett who is frowning, looking anxious as she hovers over Tracy. “What do you mean, Doc?”

Hugh looks confused as well for a fraction of a second, but then his forehead smooths out as he smiles. “I think she’s quoting Shakespeare. As usual.”

Jett snorts, warm relief coming back into her eyes. “Of course she is. Nerd.”

Right. That was the play again. “That was the play again,” Tracy murmurs, screwing up her eyes and shaking her head slightly in an attempt to clear it. The play and the past; the then-now and the now-now and the then _:_ how does anyone keep it all straight?

“Yeah. _The Tempest,_ right?” Hugh says gently. Jett shoots him a look of aggrieved betrayal.

Tracy nods. “The Tempest.” After wriggling her fingers to make sure her muscles are responding to her commands, she stretches her hand out, and Hugh takes it. Her other hand doesn’t seem to be responding quite as well, but she makes her fingers stretch a bit towards Jett, and Jett slides her calloused hand back into hers.

“When we get back to the ship,” Hugh says, squeezing her hand very lightly, “after you’re all mended up, we should do a Shakespeare night. Holo-film of the play of your choice. We can invite the whole crew. Or maybe just a double date,” he adds conspiratorially. “You and your partner, and me and mine. How would that sound?”

Tracy nods. “That sounds nice.”

Hugh smiles, and Tracy smiles back, and all at once, as though hope itself has triggered the realization, she remembers what she has managed for a few minutes to forget. She remembers what has happened, and the shuttle falls away, humming warmth weaving in and out of cold stone, and she is aware only faintly of Jett’s and Hugh’s hands in hers, the two of them staying by her side as she slides in and out of time; staying by her side and holding the hands of the Tracy that she will be in the future.

***  


Time breaks, and she sobs and sobs into Michael’s jacket, clutching her in a vain attempt to anchor herself into the present. The officer from the Euphrates laughs weakly on the other side of the wall at Tracy’s attempt at a joke, and feet and fists and metal crash into Tracy’s ribs in the other brighter room where they torture her and she tells them about the Discovery and Paul and Lorca. She feels oddly cheated as she realizes that Michael’s arms are around her, Michael is holding her, and she has missed the moment when Michael reaches for her and she reaches for Michael and she learns whether either of them will burn at the contact. Well. They must not have, neither one. And isn’t it amazing, a distant part of her wonders, that someone can hurt her more than she’d comprehended she could be hurt, and Michael can still touch her, Tracy’s physical form as present and touchable as though nothing has happened; as though nothing has happened at all?

No, she realizes in sudden terror. No, she was wrong, she is wrong, because she _is_ burning, her body flaming like lithium in water at the cool, safe touch of Michael’s arms. Tracy is burning, and the officer on the other side of the wall is moaning, and Tracy’s skin will never again un-know the imprints of feet and metal and fists.

She clings to Michael, because Michael is not causing the burning, not really; water cannot be blamed for igniting lithium any more than the toddler Miranda was to blame for being exiled with her father, their boat cast out to sea. It’s the universe, and the past, and time that is burning Tracy, burning them together, and she can hear that her voice is ragged as she pleads, “Michael it hurts it hurts please make it go away make it not have happened please please make it _stop_ ,” and Michael has both arms around her, rocking her, her voice filtering through to Tracy’s ears as though from far away, like a voice underwater, more vibration than sound. Tracy’s ear is against Michael’s collarbone and she feels her say, _Just hang on, Tracy, my love, my dear one, just hang on for another minute and another minute and another minute and soon it will feel different, I promise, just hang on and it will stop hurting so badly in just a little more time._

Tracy turns the idea over in her mind, of hanging in there another minute, and another minute, and another; of wrapping her hand around the progression of time and letting it carry her forward into instants that do not hurt as much as this one. It sounds doable. It sounds plausible. Maybe. Maybe.

“I love you, Tracy,” Michael murmurs, a half-sob rising in her voice even as her arms hold Tracy steadily against her chest. “I love you so much.”

“I love you. Michael. I love you, Michael,” Tracy manages, gripping Michael more tightly. She still feels as though she is on fire, nausea churning inside her, all of it hard and sharp and distant, just like it was as the moans on the other side of the wall weakened; as the places where they’d hit Tracy turned to bruises and the places where they’d burned her turned to fire and then to ice. Just as it did as she kept calling, kept singing, kept talking, even as the sounds on the other side of the wall faded and finally stopped.

Time breaks.

She’d thought it was only tachyons and time crystals that could rupture the linear flow of time, and hadn’t realized it could also shatter with a broken heart.

***

The shuttle engine hums steadily at warp as they clear the sector, the quiet of the passing minutes punctured only when Rhys cheers softly after Jett steps back from the helm to tell them they’re three hours out from their rendezvous location with the Discovery, and again each time Jett and Hugh trade off babysitting the autopilot. Cradled in Michael’s arms, Tracy drifts between past and present, then-now and now-now and then, clinging securely to Michael when she is aware enough to feel her partner’s arms around her, and trying, during the times when she cannot feel Michael’s presence, to do what she said, to hang on for another minute and another minute and another minute after that.

“How is she doing?” The voice is Jett’s, floating faintly toward them from the helm as Hugh steps up to relieve her, her drawl roughened gently with concern.

“Her vitals are strong.” Tracy can hear Hugh settle into his seat at the helm. “Her distress is still pretty severe, but she’s hanging in there.”

Jett’s footsteps make their way back into the shuttle, taking the seat beside them. “How are _you_ doing, Burnham?”

Michael’s voice is quiet. “I’m okay.”

“Hmm.” Jett makes a noise somewhere between doubtful and sympathetic, and Tracy feels the covers move slightly, Jett adjusting the blankets over the two of them. “You need anything to drink? Coffee? Smoothie? Tea?”

Tracy can hear a glimmer of a touched smile in Michael’s voice. “I’m okay.”

“Hmm.” Tracy can hear the rustle of Jett sinking into the seat beside them. “You holler if you need anything. Whisper, even. We’re right here.”

“I know you are, Commander.” Michael’s voice is rough, a weak spark of humor warming it as she adds, “While this shuttle could be described in many ways, ‘spacious’ is not likely to be among them.”

Tracy can hear Jett let out a gentle _ha_ at Michael’s attempt at a joke, the sound blending with Rhys’s snort from the other cot and Hugh’s chuckle from the helm. They are taking care of Michael. They are taking care of Michael, while Michael takes care of her.

“I love you.”

There is a moment of silence, and Tracy realizes that she has managed to say the words out loud.

“I love all of you. I love you.”

Another moment of startled silence, and then Jett’s hand is on her shoulder, a steady clasp, and Michael’s hand is rubbing her back under the blanket.

“We love _you_ , Tracy,” Michael murmurs, a sob in her voice again as her lips brush Tracy’s temple. “We love you.”

Tracy can feel her eyes burning, and when she closes them, warm wetness spills over her cheeks. _I love you,_ she thinks again, _I love you,_ but when her lips part to speak the only thing to come from them is a rough sob, an unintelligible sound of grief, because she felt so much love for them too, the voice behind the wall, and she will never be able to tell them that again.

Time breaks, and she is back in the cell, back in the damp and the cold and the past, but she is also here, Jett’s hand on her shoulder and Michael’s arms around her back and Michael’s cheek against her forehead. Michael is saying _hold on, hold on Tracy, I love you, just hang on,_ and Tracy does hold on, her arms gripping Michael’s torso and her face buried in Michael’s collar, the hailstorm of moments tugging and tearing at her body as she clings and clings to Michael and to herself and to whatever part of her shattered heart is still here in the present, here with Michael and their crew as they sit in their tiny shuttle, sliding onwards through the vast gentle silence of space, holding her as she makes her way into the next moment, and the next moment, and the next.


End file.
